How did the Prime Minister avoid noticing the latest vainglorious example of
EU extravagance for so long, asks Christopher Booker.

David Cameron, we learn, was "appalled" when, at their recent European Council meeting, the EU's national leaders were presented with a 16-page brochure boasting of the £280 million palace nearing completion in Brussels for the Council's president, Herman Van Rompuy.

Had our prime minister never been told about this gargantuan EU vanity project before? When I wrote about it last October, I observed that £40 million of its cost was being contributed by British taxpayers, in the same week when it had been reported that Buckingham Palace officials were pleading in vain that the Queen desperately needed the same sum, £40 million, for urgent repairs to our own royal palaces.

Mr Cameron was, of course, in a position to withhold that money from the Queen (it now seems he wants to cut her wages further). But he is powerless to prevent our money going to build a hideous new palace for the dim little Belgian apparatchik who is now head of our real government in Brussels.

The symbolism is perfect – as is that of the fact that our prime minister seemingly remained unaware of this latest vainglorious example of EU extravagance until only the other day. Perhaps he should start reading my column.